I'm starting to read through the 1800’s novel Heidi Johanna Spyri in the original German - a little bit each day - making it a vehicle for learning vocabulary.

One impression that strikes me immediately is that genders given to nouns may have been an academic flourish added to the language at some point in time... however, what the upshot is, is that it gives an allowance to writers and speakers to produce rather disjointed sentences. German sentences in literature seem to be a mess of many appended clauses. These would be considered "run-on sentences" in English. My idea, is that out in the rural areas, people got very excited about proving their intellect by knowing all the genders to the nouns... and then this rough rural language developed a very disjointed quality to it. Reading through these paragraphs makes me very happy that I speak English, where if you say "he" or "she," you know damn well it's a person which is being referred to.

I wonder further, if these genders of nouns act something like pegs or nails in a piece of wooden equipment... you can't take them out or the whole thing falls apart. I'm sure that certain progressively (and regressively) minded people sometimes want to change the gender of a noun. And I'm sure it happens from time to time... but it's a hard thing to do, because it would lead to lack of clarity. So, were genders a gambit by academics to keep an intentionally designed academic order within the language?

The broader musing would be: I wonder whether an organically evolving language like English evolves more sensibly than an academically designed language like German. Does it become quantitatively more useful and more elegant (more embellished with connotation, and synonym?)

Disclaimer (sigh... this has actually become longer than the paragraphs it refers to):

I know that my style of written personal musing can really rub a lot of people (especially folks in the USA) the wrong way. This distresses me - because I don't mean to sound arrogant. Believe it or not, humility is actually a very important value to me.

Like many of my personal meditations... this one charts out my models in a way that is obviously quite opinionated, and some would say is arrogant. I can honestly tell you that it's not meant to be. This little essay is an example of a fifteen-minute foray into the exploration of a set of models about how languages might evolve. When I'm doing that kind of mental excursion, I don't qualify my ideas on paper right away. To qualify your models, means that you've already developed your ideas to the point of maturity - and can now assent to some of the counterarguments, and possible weaknesses in your assessment. To be clear-thinking about an evolving model means that you have to be very earnest in respect to the current puzzle pieces you are putting together. Qualifying your ideas too soon can undermine that earnestness.

You may build your ideas about the world around you, differently. Maybe you synthesize pieces from what many different groups around you believe. However, I have found the method I describe to be the most effective way forward for me. It is a way of building my models separately from the mainstream preconceptions of the society in which I live.

This manner of model-building I describe, is part and parcel with why philosophical debate typically starts with "a proposition' - a novel assertion which reflects a strong conviction in the person who wants to bandy about this idea with the other folks. That starting point allows an idea to be easily weighed in the balances and tested. All the cards are on the table from the outset, for everyone to see.

In regards to the above blurb about the German language - the qualifications that brushed on my mind, but which I didn't commit to paper when I originally wrote it, are:

1. that naturally, it would not have been only academics who decided that the language ought to have genders - but it would have been a long historic tradition in the culture, which would have itself evolved organically out of perhaps a playful way of looking at the world.

2. that the "rough language" of groups of people who bear some stigma in a society is always the most innovative branch of the language. This is true with the northern parts of England. It's also true with rural people (who probably are also the ones who have more time to write novels and poetry and essays).

3. that each language has its own beauty. Genders, of course, add a lot of poetic nuance to people's discussions and meditations.

This is a wonderful series of podcasts that was broadcast last autumn on the BBC. You can see the BBC's description page for more info. There is some lead-in and lead-out audio which you may have to fast forward through.

An abridged audio book read by the author, herself, Bettany Hughes (in mp3s):

• episode 1
• episode 2
• episode 3
• episode 4
• episode 5

The above downloads are unavailable temporarily, as I transfer my files to a new webhost.

If you like it, you can support the author by buying the full book on Amazon.

It's really intriguing for me to watch or listen to BBC programs on European history. Our sense of history in the USA is so short and partial. We Anglos here don't have any sense of our cultural roots in Europe. It seems to me that there was a huge cultural shift under Constantine when the Roman Empire converted to Christianity after being a pantheistic society where everyone had their own household gods. This book gives us a glimpse through this window in time into this inspiring other world - the Athens of Socrates' day.

This poem was written by Denise Levertov, a very gifted poet. I remember reading through a book of her poems when I was in my first year of college. I think, however, that ideally this kind of poetry requires a person who has had enough life experience to be able to weigh the ideas which the poems allude to. This poem "Red Snow" is the last part of a three part story. I am sharing it here, because it seems to me that it's a very good metaphor for how intellectuals in countries like Canada and Britain vainly pursue the sport of persuasion, as the method by which they seek to effect change in their society.

Crippled with desire, he questioned it.
Evening upon the heights, juice of the pomegranate:
who could connect it with sunlight?

He took snow into his 
red from cold hands
It would not acknowledge the blood inside,
stayed white, melted only.

And all summer, beyond how many plunging valleys
                                    remote verdant lesser peaks,
still there were fields 
                        by day silver
                        hidden often in thunderheads,
but faithful before night, crimson.
He knew it was red snow

He grows tall, and sets out.
The story, inexorably, is of arrival long after, by dark.
Tells he stood waiting
                    bewildered
                       in stinging silver towards dawn
                    and looked over the abysses, back;

            the height of his home,snowy, red,
            taunted him. Fable snuffs out
                                                What did he do?

                        He grew old.
                    With bloodbright hands, he wrought 
                icy monuments.
            Beard and long hair flying he rode the whirlwind
keening the praises of red snow.

A very interesting take on Frances Burnett's novel "The secret garden." I loved this novel as well.

• National public radio story